Forever More
by who1roman4
Summary: How the epic love story that is Quinn and Rachel should have happened. Quinn is struggling with her love for Rachel.  Can a fellow gleek or two get her on track before Rachel slips away?  Set in season 2. Will change to M rating later.
1. Singing To This Empty Room

**So, I will probably eventually write a prologue to this story. There will be flashback's though. This story very much follows the plot of the show, but how it should have been written :) and would have been written if I owned glee. Which I obviously do not. Set during the end of season 2. And I would suggest listening to the songs used in the stories...because they are a big reason why I wrote the story in the first place. Anyway, enjoy. **

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><p>Rachel stood in the wings of the stage anxiously rubbing her fingers together. She wasn't nervous to sing. No, that wasn't it. She <em>craved<em> competition and the absolute thrill it ignited in her body as her lungs carried her voice higher and farther, as if for just three minutes she was not Rachel Berry from Lima, Ohio. She was Betty Lapone, Tori Amos, Barbra Streisand: she was amazing. She was admired and for those three minutes, accepted for everything she was. Hell, she was envied for everything she was. For those shining moments, Rachel Barbra Berry was free from what her peer's thought, how the small minded folk of Lima, Ohio viewed her and her beliefs, how anyone may view her and her beliefs. For those moments, they were hanging on every note, every word, and every breath. She could pour her heart and soul into her _voice_, and for those moments, she was accepted.

She wanted this, the chance to be the soloist at _Nationals_, in New York, where maybe one day all this would be her life. Where there would be no more worrying about freezing corn syrup filled, artificially flavored wakeup call splashing over her face. Just bring lights and flashes of the paparazzi just trying to grab a still form of her, for people to gaze at worldwide.

Yes she knew she was romanticizing things a little, but she had to imagine that things there had to be easier than McKinley High.

Yes, Rachel Berry wanted this and God help her if Mercedes Jones, Kurt Hummel, or Santana Lopez would stand in her way. They didn't want it as badly. Sure they wanted the fame and the glory, but Rachel _needed _it. If her life was at all worth living, she absolutely needed this.

If this past year was anything to go by, there wasn't much left at McKinley High for Rachel Berry anymore. Well sure, there were some things, but nothing that was _hers_. But this solo, the opportunity to sing at Nationals, and win nationals, that was still here for her.

So when her name was called, she took in a deep breath and walked into the semi-blinding lights of the stage.

As she walked towards center stage she had to admit that perhaps that was one of her favorite qualities of a life on stage. She couldn't see who she was singing to, couldn't see who was out there to witness the rawest side of her. It was just her unleashing her truest emotion to whoever showed up. It also meant that she couldn't see the awe on the faces of her audience, but she wouldn't see the possible rejection either. She was especially thankful for it now. She doubted she could sing this song under any other circumstances.

For that thought she mentally berated herself, _it isn't as if she would come to watch you sing…_ but in the end she preferred to not have to face anyone after this was over.

She had chosen this song for two reasons: it allowed her to immerse herself in the song to create a spectacular performance and if she didn't release what she was feeling, she may just explode. This at least was a productive way of dealing with everything that had happened as of late.

Rachel turned to the front of the stage and took a deep and steady breath. She was so caught up in her own thoughts that she barely registered the velvety voice of Jessie St. James.

"Rachel, what will you be singing for us today."

"Um, My Man, by the one and only Barbra." Rachel ushered out into the microphone.

"Excellent choice Rachel," the tone of his voice was a warning for his next comment, dripping with haughtiness. "Do you have a particular inspiration for this song?"

Rachel swallowed as silently as possible as her eyes fluttered closed subconsiously. _Of course there was. _Of course she had inspiration. Inspiration that filled her so completely that it seemed to tear through the seams of her chest uncontrollably, tossing her heart into her throat every time she faced the intensity of those hazel eyes that held flecks of gold in just the right light. Inspiration that sent tremors through her limbs, rendering them useless if they just so happened to brush against flawless porcelain skin. Inspiration that sent her into a different _world_ when that soft yet raspy voice flooded her consciousness.

_That inspiration that remained thudding in her chest, held the power to immobilize her if even for a second, every time she caught a glimpse of blond hair. _

That inspiration that thudded in her chest now.

Rachel let a slight bitter smile quirk her lips before shaking her head simply.

"No, no one in particular."

She could almost hear the dejection in Jessie's voice, but none of that mattered.

"Alright, we look forward to your performance."

Rachel nodded and the lights all shut off except for the one illuminating her body. The soft scale of the piano and harp led her into the song and she allowed herself to be swept away by the feelings that longed to be set free.

"Oh my man I love him so,

He'll never know

All my life is just despair,

But I don't care.

When he takes me in his arms..

The world, is brighter…

Alright.

What's the difference if I say…I'll go away

When I know I'll come back – on my knees some day

For whatever my man is,

I am his, forever more

_The accompaniment drove her onwards, picking up the emotion in her voice as she allowed it to take her further into the scene playing in her mind. Leaving behind the bitter sadness that cracked more than just her voice and surrendered to the words of the song, the words that she wished the blond would hear. _

Oh my man I love him so

He'll never know

_Wishing Quinn could understand._

All my life is just despair, but I don't care

_Hear the raw feeling in her voice, that raw need that Quinn pulled out of her so unwillingly. _

When he takes me in his arms

_As if the blond simply twirled her fingers, commanding unbreakable strings tied to Rachel's very being, tugging her will in any way she desired. Toying with her. Torturing her in such sweet bliss. Did the girl even know?_

The world is bright

Alright  
><em>surrendered so completely, <em>

What's the difference if I say, I'll go away

When I know I'll come back on my knees someday

_so terrifyingly easily, so ridiculously content to follow_

For whatever my man is

I am his

_Absolutely helpless to her own personal fixation that was Quinn Fabray._

Forever more.

The sound of clapping in the distance breeched her consciousness as a hot tear made a fresh path down her cheek. She tried to blink herself back into reality, to pull herself out of her personal montage of Quinn memories. The thought caught in her throat; they were only memories, nothing more. She was breathing unsteadily and she couldn't be sure if her feet were still planted on the ground. It took every ounce of composure she'd trained herself to have to crack a megawatt smile before curtsying and tearing off the stage as the emotions she'd just released from the top of her lungs began to crash down around her.

Finn Hudson had stood in the middle of the aisle as Rachel delivered her performance. His face seemed stuck in a goofy lopsided grin as he watched his ex-girlfriend sing. How had he not known? It was impossible that he hadn't known that Rachel loved him _that _much. Sure, he didn't pretend to know everything, but that performance, It was so beyond anything he knew the girl had felt for him. It was so beyond, well anything he had ever experienced. His heart was literally gripped in those tiny delicate hands as his ex-girlfriend sang.

He'd seen the longing looks, sure. When she'd been chasing after him when he was with Quinn, he'd seen that pained look in her eyes. It had made him sad at the time. He didn't ever want Rachel to feel so sad. He really did feel attached to the girl. He felt happy when she was happy and he felt sad when she was sad, but whatever she was feeling now…he couldn't be sure. It was such an intense longing. It kind of shocked him, but in a good way.

In the best way he could describe, it seemed like Rachel was trying to project her words, - No it was so much more than that. He felt something, he wasn't sure what, but something warm and so strong it seemed to phase past him. It seemed as if Rachel was trying to grasp something so far away that not even the power of her voice could reach it, which seemed strange to him because Rachel's voice seemed even stronger than when they sang together.

Finn turned to the back door as if to follow the path that Rachel's voice seemed to have left and spotted a soft glow of light coming from the hallway and the silhouette of Quinn in the doorway.

He started to raise his hand to wave, but a slight reflection of light from her cheek stopped him. He tried to make his eyes focus on her figure. Her hair seemed a little out of place, her arms were bracing her in the doorway and she seemed to be heaving a little like she'd sprinted across the school to get here. He thought it a little strange, but then he saw her face. Her expression looked pained and desperate. In a funny way, her expression almost looked familiar.

As he tried to place it, he turned back to the stage as Rachel belted out her last line. Her face was sort of strained in a way as her tiny body threw everything into her voice. He saw two tears fall along her face as she tightly shut her eyes to sing "forever more".

He turned back to Quinn to find a matching expression; tears falling down her cheeks. In a moment of confusion he turned back to Rachel as her last notes left her body and rang through the auditorium.

He felt frozen. For a reason he couldn't place or understand, he felt extremely out of place, as though he was interrupting a private moment. This seemed rather silly to him seeing as this was an audition and Mr. Schue and that annoying kid Jessie St. Jackass was there, but the feeling stuck with him in a way that nearly made him lose his lunch.

It wasn't until the last note had ceased echoing through the hall that Finn was able breathe again, much less move. When he turned around, he only caught a glimpse of blond hair disappearing behind the closing doors.


	2. Enter Santana Lopez

Santana sighed internally before wondering if she should even bother to enact her trademark eye roll. She was seriously wondering if it was even worth it. The scene before her was possibly more pathetic than Mr. Schue's sex life with the socially awkward ginger and that was seriously saying something. But seriously, this situation was a serious contender.

Mercedes looked like she just shit a week worth of tater tots and Kurt was sniffling like a belt whipped baby and all because the little diva man-hands had just sung a song.

Well…maybe it was a little bit more than that. It _had_ after all _maybe_ made Santana feel a sort of longing, but it wasn't as if she could help it. Santana didn't like it, but the dwarf could sing. What, her voice was emotive and all that crap. That didn't mean that she deserved to win the whole damn solo though. After all, she'd wasted all of that emotion in a performance for that stupid overgrown man child instead of who she'd really sung it for.

Sure, the dwarf had said the song wasn't for anyone in particular, but Santana knew that tell tail pause and the shifty glances the diva gave before her answer. Now that she could roll her eyes about; who was she trying to fool? The midget had always been a terrible liar and it made for excellent gossip gathering for the Latina. Berry couldn't hide something for the life of her.

Unless it was from Finn Hudson. Seriously, the boy was dumber than a sack of potatoes.

Santana scoffed as she caught him looking like an overexcited puppy dog, swiveling his head from the stage to the back door like he didn't know which one was more interesting. _What an idiot, doesn't even know which direction the stage is, _Santana snickered, but then caught site of a silhouette in the doorway.

Santana almost choked. _No fucking shit. _ Quinn freaking Fabray was standing in the doorway on the verge of _tears_.

The Latina's jaw dropped slightly as her attention was pulled from the tiny diva on stage. Quinn Fabray may have turned into a slight crybaby after popping one out, but this was so much more than a hormone induced breakdown. Quinn Fabray looked heartbroken.

Santana would have laughed.

She really _should_ have. After all, it was a ridiculous scene that she really could hold over Quinn's head for the remainder of the year. But instead of fighting the urge to laugh, the Latina was fighting the pangs of pain in her chest.

Although Santana would probably never admit it, it really hurt to see her friend like that. And she definitely would never admit that it sort of hurt to see the dwarf hurting like that too.

Honestly, the two were kind of pathetic.

Santana had always known where the interests of the head cheerleader lay.

The day Sue had dragged her and Quinn into the auditorium to watch those "off-key crooning glee kids", Santana had known about Quinn's little crush on the pint-sized singer. They had been singing some stupid Journey song with Finn and Rachel at the lead. It had been rather fortunate for Santana's sake that she hadn't been paying attention because the look on Quinn's face had been priceless. The blonde's attention was completely absorbed by the dynamic diva. In fact, she'd been staring so hard that Santana would have guessed the pipsqueak was naked instead of wearing a simple red tee and jeans. But Quinn's gaze was only for the singer, just not the right one: Quinn's boyfriend. Not that the Latina could blame her, Finn _had_ looked super lame.

It had only been further confirmed when her best friend had painted that bull's-eye on Berry's back. Santana had almost felt sorry for the diva from the sheer relentlessness of the attacks, but she had to admit that seeing the girl's face after being hit with her first slushy was pretty damn hilarious. Or it would have been if Santana hadn't seen the flash of regret in the head cheerleader's eyes when the drenched girl just stood there in shock before sprinting off to the nearest bathroom, leaving behind a trail of grape slushy.

And then there was the incessant fighting between the two. The Latina never understood why Quinn even allowed it to go on. She was the center of the unholy trinity for fucking sake. She could have the girl destroyed if she _really_ tried. Hell, even if she hadn't. The school dropped everything for the unholy trinity, they were high school royalty. Instead the two engaged in constant cat fight's and the brunette cheerleader _might _have been thrown off the blonde's scent and mistaken the fights for hatred if Puckerman wasn't always such a horn dog and whispered to her how "hot" their fights were getting.

She'd rolled her eyes with a scowl on her face for his constant attempts to get into a threesome, but as she watched the two continue to bicker, she had to admit that the man whore did have a point. Those two had always been swarming with sexual tension. And yeah, _maybe _she thought it was a little hot too, but she blamed that on hanging out with Puck too much. Yet, there were still too many times to count where the dwarf and tubbers had reached a height in their fight where she was _sure _that the two would either come to blows or make out in a frenzy.

After Finn had been thrown out of prom, Santana figured that the blonde had been mad enough and maybe the gigantic pool of Quinn and Rachel tension would finally boil over and the two would fuck the sexual tension out of each other and get the hell over it, but by looking at the Romeo, Juliet, and Man-child scene acted out on the bottom floor of the auditorium, that hadn't happened. _Well, the fucking part probably did,_ Santana thought with a smirk before a brief image of the blond and the diva intertwined, flashed in her head. The ex-cheerleader had to shake her head vigorously to get _that_ image out.

Okay, so mad-hands was kind of hot if she wasn't talking or anything and Quinn wasn't shabby either, but she was _not_ about to go fantasizing about the two of them. That was just disturbing on too many levels.

Before Santana could dwell on the fact that she'd just pictured her best friend and the most annoying dwarf in the world together _naked_, said diva was belting out her last line ripping shivers through the Latina that left her with an emotion she couldn't exactly describe except that she'd felt it while looking at an entirely different blond.

Pushing a lump of air from her lungs, Santana tried to regain control of her breathing. She looked back towards the door only to catch the light spilling in from the hallway slipping away.

"Damn it Quinn…" Santana huffed under her breath. She may not have known how to handle situations that dealt with relationship stuff, but she was pretty sure running away after Berry spilled her guts like that was _not_ a good thing to do.

Santana crossed her arms. Trying to replay the events of the last two minutes in her mind, she could only come to a single ridiculous, but unmistakable conclusion.

_Well fuck me three ways to Sunday. Q and Berry are grossly and completely in love…_

"As much as I hate to admit it, that was so beautiful." Kurt sniffled; bring the Latina out of her revelation. Wheezy still looked like she'd shit herself.

Santana rolled her eyes at the pair; the two gossip queens of McKinley had obviously completely missed the more interesting performance. Santana's gaze lazily traveled back to Berry who gave a tiny curtsy before rushing off stage and then to Finn who was still apparently watching some ping pong match between the microphone and the back door. Except instead of looking like an overexcited mutt, he just looked like someone had told him that video games weren't the answer to life.

How could that dimwit _actually_ believe he had the most popular girl and most talented girl (after her of course) chasing after him like he had some amazing light shooting from his ass? Hell the boy had even thought that she actually wanted him for a while. She really had to knock some sense into that boy. And if by _chance_ she just so _happened_ to knock some sense into the most dysfunctional couple in glee club, so be it.

Without a second glance to the two second rate divas still stunned to silence, Santana rose to her feet and slipped out of the back door with a plan of mischief in her mind.

What do you think? Review please :)


	3. Ever the Runner

Hey all, sorry for the delay. I had a little trouble with this one and hopefully it still flows well. Well...let me know :)

Furthermore, enjoy.

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><p>"Fabray!"<p>

The ex-queen bee did _not_ want to stop. She'd been running for such a long time, it was hard to think of when she'd started.

If she was just thinking of today, it had started with a confrontation with _Rachel_. Hell, didn't it always?

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><p>The diva had approached her innocently enough, but the second the brunette mentioned that she'd heard Finn had broken up with her, Quinn could feel the hair's rising on the back of her neck and anxiety settling in her stomach.<p>

"Yes, he broke up with me at the Funeral." Quinn replied emotionlessly. Surely this was the last thing she wanted to talk to the diva about. Her shield had abandoned her. Her shield from persecution, her security of popularity, her resolve from these feelings had all left her. Why? So that he could try to sweep _her_ off of her feet.

Quinn wasn't good enough for him anymore. He wanted someone who still _felt _something because _his _feelings for Rachel were _real_.

_As if he even knew what real was, _Quinn wanted to spit at his feet. His pathetic lover boy romance towards the diva made her sick. He _never_ did anything for Rachel. When he tried, he did things that he wanted to do, like take her bowling. He couldn't stand up for her in glee. He couldn't even stop his own teammates from harassing her in the hallways. He didn't feel the _need_ to protect the singer. How could he possibly think that _he_ was the one for Rachel?

But it didn't matter; he left her for Rachel, who was moments away from running back into _his_ arms. He's what she always wanted anyway. Not some washed up ex-cheerleader. Not the unwed teen mother who couldn't even keep her baby. Not her tormenter. Not Quinn.

No it didn't matter what she had said. Or what she had whispered to Quinn the night of prom. It hadn't mattered that they had silently taken Rachel's Limo to the Berry's house and stolen the bottles of champagne that Jessie had stashed in the back. Or that Quinn had drunkenly confessed her love for Rachel and that Rachel had ferociously kissed her before Quinn could even finish her confession. It definitely didn't matter that Rachel had asked Quinn to make love to her and that she had desperately complied.

None of it mattered because Quinn had woken up before Rachel, her legs still intertwined with bare tan ones, her arms still wrapped around the effortlessly soft skin of Rachel's back, and her lips inches away from Rachel's. None of it mattered because Quinn had woken up to a dream; the girl who'd hijacked her life was in her arms. And she ran.

She'd overheard the diva talking to Kurt the following Monday. Quinn's breath caught at the sight of the diva and ducked back behind the corner. The boy had asked her if she'd still had fun after her date got kicked out of the party thanks to his step-brother. The blonde had scowled at that, but had remained breathless, waiting for the diva's reply. "Actually, I don't remember." She'd said sheepishly, and Quinn could practically imagine that shy, effortlessly beautiful smile of the brunette. "I woke up with champagne bottles in my room." Rachel had laughed, the twinkling giggle fading down the hallway.

Quinn had run on that day too, with the shattering realization that although _she_ remembered every word, every touch, and every _kiss_; it may as well have just been a dream.

With a single instinct, she'd erased the chance of ever having Rachel. Rachel didn't remember. It wasn't as if she could just remind the girl now. Quinn had taken Rachel's virginity. Rachel would hate her forever. She'd think it was some cruel joke. Or even if the diva did believe her, she'd be crushed that Quinn would just take her and leave her, and that was if she could ever get over the fact that Quinn had taken her virginity while she was drunk.

When she'd realized where she was, she'd somehow ended up in the auditorium sitting on the piano bench, breathing hard, her fingers still on the keys. She wasn't sure what had just happened, but there were lyrics swimming through her head and she was sure she heard the remnants of a chord and maybe her voice still ringing through the auditorium.

That day when she'd left the auditorium, she'd reattached herself to Finn and held her head high just the way her mother had taught her.

Quinn had been brought back to the present with Rachel's uncertain voice.

"Oh, well…I'm very sorry to hear that." _Sure you are. "_I just wanted to ask you, since…well, Finn seemed to be flirting with me earlier and I wanted to make sure he wasn't being unfair to you or anything like that because that would be a horrible thing for him to do to you." Rachel's eyes never left Quinn's, searching, as she rambled, but the ex-cheerleader was hardly paying attention.

Finn hadn't even waited a week to make his move, she thought, clenching her teeth as her eyes found the ground. She wanted to scream. Finn freaking Hudson was working his way up to steal Rachel, _her Rachel, _and there wasn't a thing she could do about it.

When Quinn hadn't responded except for the clenching of her fists, Rachel had felt the need to fill the silence.

"Yes, well…again, I'm really sorry to hear about your, um…split." Rachel tried to continue. Her eyes found the ground briefly before returning her gaze to Quinn. She spoke so softly Quinn almost felt herself start to relax. "You two did look so stunning at prom-"

Quinn flinched visibly at the mention of that night. Before she could even think to stop it, stinging pain prickled at her eyes and she stood to face the far wall away from Rachel. The ex-cheerleader had moved so fast she'd completely missed the flash of hope in the brunette's eyes. Rather she seethed in place as her skin began to boil. It felt as though her head was in a bubble and everything around her seemed dulled and hazy. How _dare_ Rachel bring up Prom. There was no way the brunette could understand what that night had meant to her.

"Yes, well we _obviously _know that didn't last very long. Why would you bring up that _terrible_ memory?" Quinn sneered, swiveling to advance on the drawn back diva. Her glare was worthy of her most frightening and immobilizing glare and it managed to take full effect on the brunette.

As much as it pained her, Quinn knew that the sentiments of her words carried far more meaning than just for her flimsy date with Finn that night. The truth was she felt far more anguish for the day after prom, a torment that the brunette could clearly feel as the girl's face dropped from fright to suffering; the beginnings of tears in her eyes.

An intense tug on her heart strings stole the blonde's breath as she gazed at the brunette. Her body was buzzing and it felt as if every nerve ending was firing distress throughout her system; screaming at her for making the brunette cry, again.

It didn't really occur to Quinn why Rachel was crying. It was such a reflex reaction for Rachel to cry after Quinn berated her that the blonde just felt herself sink further into herself, burying her hopes for Rachel further away. She was bad for Rachel; couldn't Quinn just get that through her mind? All she ever did was hurt her. It was barely even a wonder why she'd heard Rachel say she didn't remember what happened after prom. It was probably so traumatizing that she couldn't bear to remember it. Her worst enemy took her virginity that she was saving until she was 25, for someone she _loved_.

No, Rachel did not want _her_.

Rachel tried to open her mouth, but before words could be formed Quinn was already striding out of the room as fast as her legs could carry her.

She briefly heard the words, "Quinn, wait, but I-" before she'd passed through the doorway and just as she was about to break into a full out sprint, a firm yet delicate grip encompassed her wrist and pulled, hard.

Caught off balance by the unexpected pull, Quinn staggered backwards into the room to face a heart wrenching expression of passion in those dark brown eyes.

Rachel's eyes were slightly red and tear tracks were fresh and wet on her cheeks. Her eyes wielded questions and so much pain that Quinn felt her heart drop straight out of her chest to flop around helplessly on the floor.

Quinn just stared back into those desperate eyes until Rachel harshly looked away, her hair swaying after her head.

"How could you say that, Quinn…" The girl's voice was so small, so reduced from its usual grandeur, so dejected.

The blonde's mind only flailed as it tried to come up with an answer. When both girls had remained silent for too long, the diva's attention shot back to Quinn and a familiar flame had returned to her eyes.

"That night was-!" Quinn nearly flinched as Rachel's voice had returned, yelling at the helpless blonde, but the rage quickly diminished as Rachel continued softly, "That night was everything to me."

Quinn's eyebrow's shot to her hairline as her jaw dropped unceremoniously. "But I thought you…I didn't think that you rem-"

"Of course I did!" the diva choked. "How could I ever forget? You told me…You told me that you-"

"Don't." Quinn shot harshly before she could stop herself. That damn bubble had reappeared and seemed to swallow her thoughts into raging chaos in her mind. Half of her, the instinctual side was demanding her to run. The rest of her was screaming at her to fix this, to make Rachel stop crying, to do anything to get the girl back in her arms.

Rachel stared back forlornly before her expression turned angry and a fresh set of tears ran down her perfect face.

"No Quinn! You _don't _get to be mad at me! You were the one that said it first! I was trying to stay out of your way, just like you said before regionals. I resigned myself to just sit there and watch you with _Finn_ because you said that's what you _wanted_. I was going to give you up that night. I was so ready to move on and let you go because it just hurt too much. But don't you _dare _act like this is all my fault because _you_ were the one that who said we should leave. _You_ were the one that took my hand and led me to the limo and _you_ were the one that followed me to my room!" Rachel was lost in full blown rant, her small arms shoving Quinn with every emphasis until her hands came to lie on Quinn's smooth shoulders exhaustedly.

The blonde remained silent as she let the starlet take her frustrations out on her body. Every shove was deserved, after everything she'd done to the poor girl. And Rachel was right, she'd initiated everything. She thought things were under control. She thought things would feel right if she was the girl on Finn's arm. She thought Rachel just wouldn't matter anymore. She was going to win prom queen and that would be the end of the confusing and unbelievably frustrating chapter of her life that was Rachel Berry.

But of course, that hadn't happened. When Rachel had sung Jar of Hearts, and made eye contact with Quinn as she was dancing with Finn, it had made her feel sick to her stomach. Her body burned everywhere Finn touched her and in the least pleasurable way possible.

When Quinn had seen Jessie all over Rachel, her blood boiled and despite her efforts to deny it, that gaping hole in her chest only widened threating to swallow her in its sorrow once and for all. As much as it hurt and only reaffirmed the fact that Finn wasn't right for her, the annoying lug had actually done her a favor by picking a fight with Jessie. Once the boys were gone, it seemed as though everything that happened that night had already been set in motion.

Rachel's small grasp on her shoulders tightened slightly as the diva tried to prepare herself for her next words. This time Quinn offered no resistance and Rachel's voice was soft and vulnerable.

"You were the one who said you loved me." Rachel bit back a sob. Quinn fought back tears and declined her head slightly.

"You were the one who took my virginity." Quinn could feel tears falling. Rachel spoke again in only a whisper and Quinn could feel it coming a mile away.

"And you were the one that left, and you were the one who was going to let me forget that it had ever happened."

A sob broke out and Quinn couldn't be sure who it came from. She felt as if her body had melted away and pooled onto the floor where she stood as the guilt manifested itself in her bones. How could she have been so stupid. Her fear, her sheer failure to ever take the consequences of her actions had led to this. How could Rachel ever forgive her?

Quinn couldn't decide what was worse: her situation five minutes ago or her situation now. Five minutes ago she thought that Rachel would never know how she felt, that she wouldn't remember their night. Now Quinn knew she'd been caught for running away and avoiding the magnitude of what that night held not only for herself but for _Rachel_. The pain was so plainly etched in the wrinkles near the starlet's eyes, her skin shining under tear tracks, and the quivering of the small girl's perfect lips.

She barely registered small hands slipping from her shoulders or the sudden and unbearable emptiness of the room.

There wasn't anything she could say anyway.

There was no telling how long she'd stood there. She was sure she'd missed at least several periods by now, but none of it really seemed to matter. The only thing that drew her from her stupor was the annoying quacking from her pocket.

Quinn sighed deeply as she pulled the offending device from its place. The screen signaled a text from Brit. Obviously the girl had, once again, stolen her phone to change her assigned ringtone to 'ducks'.

Her fingers glided mindlessly over the keys to retrieve the message.

"R U GONNA WATCH SANNY SING? SHE'S NXT AFTER RACH."

Her heart throbbed loudly as her eyes raked over Rachel's name. She'd nearly forgotten about the auditions for the nationals solo. It wasn't as if she'd ever cut it to sing lead on _that_ big of a stage. She always assumed it would be another painful Rachel and Finn duet with everyone swaying jealously in the background; her for an entirely different reason.

Her heart lurched again at the thought. How could she have screwed up so badly. Then again it wasn't all that big of a surprise, she tended to screw up quite spectacularly rather often. But this seemed to be in an entirely different league, she'd _never_ wanted something so badly. Rachel set her world on fire. She always had. It seriously surprised her how she'd managed to ignore the true meaning of her feelings for so long.

Sure Quinn Fabray was ever stubborn, but when it came to Rachel, the girl was _all_ Quinn could ever see. And when she sang? The entire world dropped away and it was just her, sitting in her chair watching Rachel under the spotlight of her gaze. It would always just be the two of them when Quinn watched Rachel sing, it always made her feel completely grounded and flittering in the air at the same time.

Grounded because her feelings always felt so undeniably validated when Quinn could believe it was just her and Rachel in the room. Where nothing else mattered: not her father, not her religion, not her popularity, not _Finn_; only her and Rachel.

In the air because it was as if she could catch a ride on Rachel's voice, sending her flying in a way that reminded her of Aladdin and that magic carpet ride. It was exhilarating and probably the only time she ever felt anything in her sham of a perfect life. It took her away from all of the damn pretending like she would actually feel fulfilled by winning a stupid crown.

If she could just hold onto that flying feeling, maybe she could give it all up: the picture perfect family, her white picket fence, prom queen and high school sweet heart. Sure, it was nice to look at, but Finn _had _been a little right when he called Quinn out on not feeling anything anymore. None of that mattered, even if it made her life somewhat easier to navigate.

As Quinn looked around the room, she let out a heavy sigh. It was still unbearably empty and it stood as quite a metaphor for how she felt right now. How she would probably feel for the rest of her life.

The last thought resonated hard within Quinn. It was too much. If she was condemned to this feeling for the rest of her life, this feeling of nothing, then she needed to feel something at least one more time.

Quinn was already out the door before the thought of how similar she sounded to an addict crossed her mind. That explained her mother at least, except instead of a bottle of gin, Quinn was using a five foot nothing diva to fill the void. She wondered sarcastically if her mother would be proud that they still at least had _something_ in common.

As she ran through the hallways, students cowered and darted out of the way. For once she didn't care other than the fact that it made it easier to reach the auditorium.

She threw open the doors to find Rachel on stage as a voice she recognized with a quelling anger as Jessie St. James asked if she had any inspiration for her song.

Despite her aching lungs' screaming displeasure, her breath caught in her throat. There was a second where Quinn saw _something_ in the diva's body language before she simply denied it and prepared for her song.

The melody began and Quinn could already feel herself drift away and when Rachel's voice carried over the music Quinn closed her eyes.

She could feel herself dancing with Rachel in some faraway place. Rachel's voice never ceased to amaze her. The things it did to her. It was so incredibly beautiful, tantalizingly pure. It coaxed so many things from Quinn and lured so many emotions to flow through her veins in a way nothing else could.

As the song picked up, she could hear Rachel's voice growing stronger and more resolute than she had ever heard before. She could almost feel the longing in Rachel's voice. It played on her heartstrings releasing an achingly desperate song, mirroring the expression of the voice that flooded her consciousness.

Quinn opened her eyes suddenly, bracing herself in the doorway as she began to notice the actual lyrics of the song. The moment her eyes opened, tears seemed pouring having been held back by her eyelids. She watched the small diva work herself up to the finale, sucking in every emotion and inch of air around her, while Quinn seemed unable to find any.

She knew Rachel couldn't see her, heaving in the doorway as she felt every emotion the diva radiated, but there was a moment before Rachel began to belt out her last lines where it almost seemed as though the diva was looking right at her, right into her soul and latching onto it with an invisible string. She felt as though she was being suffocated by the emotions released on stage as the string seemed to secure itself soundly within her.

If she had been thinking at all, she would have thought that Coach Sylvester had known exactly what she was talking about, being tethered to someone else.

_Forever more_

The lines rang out clear and seemed to cement the hold that Rachel had always had on her. It was then that Quinn realized it was silly think that the overwhelming emotion coursing through out her body had been the materialization of Rachel's feeling within her own body. She was sure Rachel had released all of hers in the song, but everything Quinn felt right now, was all her own.

Without a second thought Quinn bolted from the doorway as more tears bled from her eyes. She had come to fill her void with something and received much more than she bargained for. All she needed now was a place to be alone. She couldn't face anyone like this. She had to get away, she had to think. She was literally choking on her own emotions. What on earth was she supposed to do now?

She had no idea where she was going, but that seemed irrelevant. She just wanted to keep moving because it seemed as though when she stood still, everything was just too much. It wasn't fair. She either felt nothing at all or far too much to handle. Why couldn't there just be some damn happy medium?

"Fabray!"

Her name barked into her consciousness and she damned herself for being so well trained and obedient to authority. Her heels came together in a militaristic halt before composing her face into the most neutral expression she could manage with tear streaked cheeks and red eyes.

"What do you want, Lopez."


	4. Asking Nicely Just Isn't as Fun

**AN: Slight Finn Bashing and Santana slamming. R&R. **

"What do you want, Lopez."

Santana took in the sight of Quinn Fabray. Honestly, it was hard to take her bitch look seriously when her when she looked like such a sap. Either way, it still seemed to do the trick as the peasants cleared the hell out of the hallway.

As great as their thirst for gossip was, they knew better to stick around when the two HBIC's faced each other like that, lest they become part of the carnage. When titans clashed, civilian casualties were a given.

"I was just wondering if you'd like to join the rainbow parade. I mean with you and stubbles, the numbers are really growing." Santana smirked, her hands coming to rest on cocked hips.

The blonde's features twisted immediately, forming a furious glare and growled. "You have _no _idea what you're talking about."

"Oh please." Santana sassed, rolling her eyes. She stalked towards the blonde who stiffened at the Latina's growing proximity. "After a show like that and you running around like a crazed banshee? Look Q, your girl can sing, but that wasn't the only show I was watching."

After eying the girl for a few moments, without more than a hardened glare for a reaction, Santana began to circle the blonde slowly.

"I mean, I shoulda known earlier. You two fight over the Finoccence like he's a damn fire hydrant. And sure, you guys act like a couple of bitches in heat, but neither of you are looking at _him _when that little itch comes around."

Santana frowned. Quinn was ignoring her. That wouldn't do.

"Not to mention all the eye-fucking you two did at prom." She drawled, circling up behind the fringed blonde slowly.

Smirking as if she were dangling a mouse before a cat, Santana leaned towards the ex-captain's ear and taunted, "Tell me, was Berry any good in the sack?"

That did it. The Latina could practically _feel_ the girl next to her bristle.

She barely had enough time to brace herself when her back slammed into cold metal and razor sharp fingernails curled into her bare shoulders. The blonde was in her face, seething.

"_Feisty._" Santana exhaled, slightly caught off guard. Sure she'd meant to rile the girl up. She needed evidence after all, and it was easiest to just go straight to the source: the queen of pressed lemons herself.

Besides, it's not like Quinn could hurt her. Well, not that badly anyway. She'd taken the bitch before and she could sure as hell do it again.

Quinn was raging. Anger was flashing through her eyes like warning signals as she ground her second in charge further into the lockers, their bodies flush against one another.

"There is _nothing_ going on between Rachel and I." The blonde grounded out between clenched teeth.

For her part, Santana just smirked in the furious girl's face. "_Rachel, _huh? And is this what you call _nothing_?" She motioned to their position.

If Quinn had been thinking now, she'd have realized that she was giving away everything by her reactions. The exact situation Santana had baited her into. But the blonde only saw red, lots and lots of red with Santana's face smack dab in the middle like a bull's-eye. Her muscles were tensing, squeezing her fingers tighter around Santana's shoulders preparing for a strike.

Every frustration with her life: her family, her baby, her failures, _Rachel_. She could take it out on the infuriating bitch that always just _had_ to dig her long, constantly manicured, Satan red, fingernails under Quinn's skin at every turn. And the witch was just practically daring her to do it, that taunting smirk and twinkle of mischief in her eyes.

No, her tell didn't matter. It wasn't even in the realm of her mind. Not when every inch of her body was burning to wipe that smirk of that arrogant face.

Quinn felt her dominant arm reel back as the leer on the Latina's face seemed to deepen when a voice shattered through the red haze concealing her mind.

"What the hell!"

The indignant squawk bounced around her mind, deflecting her rage in favor of confusion for a split second. It was the moment needed to bring her vision into clarity.

Santana was smashed against the lockers with a shocked look on her face and her own pale arm was tensed to throw a punch: into her best friend's face.

Quinn stumbled backwards unsteadily, a look of shame and horror etched in her features. The death grip on the brunette was released and the ex-cheerleader slackened slightly against the lockers. A terribly awkward and disturbed Finn Hudson stood ten feet down the hall, watching the scene in complete confusion.

The Latina wasn't always the best of friends, but she was still her best friend. She would _never_ hit the girl. Well, at least not punch her dead on in the face, scratch, claw, and slap maybe. No matter how much the girl made it her damn job to poke the flames within her, _that, _would have been taking it way too far.

What the hell was wrong with her? She was completely out of control. And Quinn Fabray, was _never_ out of control.

Hot anger was still coursing through her veins and it was so much different than the times they had fought before. She hadn't cared so much about Santana telling her to stay away from Puck. That had been a bitch fight about who carried the bigger stick down the halls of McKinley High. This had been something else entirely. If that oaf hadn't stumbled upon them, she would have done everything in power to beat the living _shit_ out of Santana. And quite frankly, other than being an annoying bitch and an ever present pain in the ass, Santana had nothing to do with her anger. That hadn't stopped her from taking things out on other people before, but this, this had scared her.

Quinn caught movement in her peripheral, snapping the moment of still shock between the three of them.

The blonde shot a helpless look between her best friend and Finn, her mouth moving to attempt some explanation. But as for so many of her actions lately, there was none. She couldn't explain why Santana's taunting about Rachel had pushed her so far. She couldn't explain how a few jabs, the sort the Latina threw her way daily, turned her into a raging monster. She couldn't explain how angry and frustrated she was or even why. All of it was her fault anyway; how she'd been about to break Santana's nose, why Rachel brought up so many unrestrained emotions within her, and how there was absolutely nothing she could do about it now. She'd brought it all on herself, again.

She felt the sting of fresh tears at her eyes and with one last pleading glance to Santana, Quinn took off down the hall, her face covered with her hands.

* * *

><p>Santana blew out a long breath between her teeth as Quinn disappeared around the far corner.<p>

She'd expected Quinn to get mad. Hell she'd planed for it.

Santana held no false pretenses about the friendship she and Quinn shared. They weren't the normal type of friends that shared secrets at sleepovers or talked about their feelings, like, at all.

It would be easy to say they didn't have feelings because they were just cold hearted bitches, a fact Santana practically encouraged others to believe, but she and Q shared a secret sort of bond over the truth. It was a strictly unspoken one, but both Santana and Quinn definitely had feelings and they both understood what it was like to have them trapped inside.

Of course they each had their particular reasons. Santana kept hers under her hot bitch persona because it was easier than having to deal with rejection. From friends, from family, from Brittney; it wasn't so much the being unpopular part. Santana fully believed if you were unpopular, it was probably because you were annoying, ugly, or a big fat loser. But even unpopular people were accepted.

Santana's problem was the crippling fear of being rejected because of who she was, for not being accepted for who she was. She couldn't understand how the most pure emotion she'd ever known was so outright disgusting to so many people. She couldn't understand why adults like the Fabray's condemned people for love. It killed her inside.

Kurt was out, but it wasn't as if he could have ever hid his gleaming rainbow beacon anyway and people _expected _him to be gay. It was almost natural. But for Santana Lopez to be a lesbian? The guys would trample her, _convincing _her that she wasn't. That they just needed to show her what it was like to be with a _real_ man. The thought made her absolutely sick.

They made it seem like the way she felt about Brittney, just wasn't real. It was _experimenting_. It was for _their_ entertainment. No, Santana's true love, didn't exist.

So she hid it. Protected her love. Kept it pure.

Okay, maybe she wasn't going about it the right way either, but she couldn't help it. She was so damn scared.

So believe it or not, Santana _understood_ where Quinn was coming from. The girl could even possibly have it worse than she did. Quinn Fabray kept her feelings frozen and cut off as she walked around like an ice queen because she was _expected _to. God forbid her parents ever suspected her for the raging lesbo that Santana now knew she was, the Fabray's condemned feelings. Period.

It was no wonder the girl's capacity for showing, much less _talking, _about her feelings was crippled worse than Artie. What, it was just the truth? At least the boy still had a functioning upper half. Quinn on the other hand, well, you get the idea.

So when Santana decided to find out just how deep Quinn's feelings ran, it wasn't as if she could just _ask_ the girl about them. That would get the girl locked up tighter than the ginger consoler's legs. Instead Santana enacted one of her more creative methods. Okay so maybe it wasn't creative, but it was effective.

Instinctively Santana traced the angry fingernail marks on her shoulders. '_Damn well effective.'_

"What the hell is going on here, Santana!"

The girl was pulled from her musings by the high pitched cracks in Finn's strained voice.

Santana had completely forgotten about the dim-witted giant standing in the hallway. She frowned before turning her gaze towards him.

His eyes were slightly bugged out and he had blobs of perspiration on his completely lost face. He also looked scared. That could possibly explain the twisted up nature of his expression, a reaction to the fact that the friendly green giant had just shit himself.

"None of your business, Man-boobs." She snipped. The situation was more serious than she thought; she'd have to do some more scheming before she did anything else.

Finn clenched his fists as his face twisted into an aggravated glare.

Nothing was making sense today. Rachel had seemed off for half the day, even though he'd been really nice to her that morning. Then Rachel had sang such an emotional song about him, but there had been something weird about Quinn when she was in the doorway and something had just felt off. And now he saw Quinn pinning _Santana_ to a locker and looked as though she was about to punch the other girl's face in?

He couldn't shake the fact that for some reason all of these things felt like they had something to do with one another, but he couldn't figure out why. It's not like Rachel had ever been friends with Quinn and definitely not Santana, so that shouldn't be related, but the feeling stuck with him. Could it have something to do with the fact that all three of them had kissed him before?

Santana was just turning to leave so Finn grabbed her arm.

Santana jerked out of his grip the instant she realized his meaty paws were on her. She fixed him with her cruelest glare, growling so deeply he cowered slightly. "Don't. You. Dare. Touch. Me."

She couldn't believe the nerve of the boy in front of her. What made him think he had the right to just grab her? Hadn't she made herself clear enough when she'd blown him off five seconds ago?

Finn gulped slightly. Was it unmanly of him to be scared of Santana? He couldn't help it; the girl was Satan's spawn herself. Sure he'd been scared of Scary Quinn, but that was because she was his girlfriend at the time and she was just plain intimidating. Then again, what he'd witnessed moments ago was something else. He'd never, ever, seen Quinn like that before, even when he'd broken up with her. Hell, he'd never even seen her that emotional before. Even if the brunette scared him, he had to find out why Quinn was acting like this.

"Just tell me what is going on! You, Quinn, and Rachel are acting all weird and I don't get it!"

Santana's glare remained, but she scoffed at him. "As if that's any new for you, Finept. You never understand what's going on right in front of your face, much less your relationships."

Finn scrunched his eyebrows. What was she talking about?

Seeing the confused expression deepen on the giant toddlers face, Santana smirked.

"Oh, let me guess," Her fingers and thumb came to rest on her chin in a mockingly thoughtful manner as she walked towards him with her chin cocked, sneering, "Do you think that all of this has something to do with _you_?" She finished, raising an eyebrow tauntingly.

The boy seemed to gulp slightly. '_Of course he did. Typical Finaptatude, thinking every girl in the McKinley cries over him.' _The thought irritated her. Why did guys always think they were the center of a girl's world? '_Screw scheming. I'ma knock some sense into him right now.'_

"Oh please, you overgrown man-child. Do you _really _think the epic Quinn-Rachel squabble has been over _you're dumb ass_?" She emphasized, stalking towards him menacingly. "Grow a _brain_, Finept. You're a mediocre jock who can barely spell his own name. I mean, really dude, its four letters long. You're leading man potential is about as long as you lasted in bed, which was _very _short. And you look and smell like a sack of potatoes on a _good_ day. " Santana finished, backing Finn against the lockers with the distain in her voice alone.

Finn was speechless; he looked to be on the verge of tears, clenching his fists despite his vulnerable position.

Santana almost had to sigh. She was _not_ about to watch the overgrown man-child, _actually_ become an overgrown man-child. That was one of the things on her list she hoped she'd never have to see. It would be so pathetic, she may actually die by witnessing its pathetic-ness.

"Look Finn. I'm not sayin' that someone…somewhere out there won't love you…someday." She paused, looking away, annoyed that came out as almost nice. "I'm just sayin', all those crappy ass love songs, the pathetic puppy dog stares, the over the top berry-style drama, and their incessant squabbling?" She eyed him seriously, "Yeah, not for you."

Finn's face sunk back into confusion and Santana actually groaned in frustration.

"Whatever. Figure the rest out yourself." She said rolling her eyes as she turned to walk away, before adding, "Even you should be able to do that."


	5. Reflections

Quinn Fabray was a wreck. No, that was a gross underestimate of her current state of being. Quinn was absolutely beside herself as she tore through the halls of the god forsaken school that was McKinely. Honestly, sometimes she thought her life would have been so much better if she'd stayed Lucy damn Cabbosey and never transferred into another district. Maybe she would have gone to Carmel High and never met the…the infinitely infuriating…abomination that was Rachel Berry.

The girl was a metaphorical; screw it, a literal tornado to Quinn's life. From the very second Quinn first laid her eyes on her, on the very first day of freshman year when Quinn was just a baby cheerleader she should have turned and ran. That and never come back.

That was the biggest problem. Quinn Fabray was ever a runner, and a damn good one at that. At every opportunity in her life, when the metaphorical shit she'd caused was hurdling into the fan, she'd run and leave everyone else to clean up the mess. She'd run from her humiliating years in middle school, run from the responsibility of cheating on Finn and getting pregnant with Puck, hell she'd even run away from the pain that thinking about Beth brought. It wasn't something she was particularly proud of and it probably didn't help her status as a world class bitch, but it was easy and relatively painless and that is exactly how Quinn Fabray wanted to go through life.

But of course a tiny doe-eyed girl in the form of Rachel Barbra Berry had managed to slip her tiny ineffectual hands into her life and drop a huge ass wrench into the classic Fabray plan. And since the day Quinn had mistakenly made eye contact with those gorego…annoyingly sappy brown eyes, the girl had somehow rooted herself in Quinn's mind.

That day could be marked as the beginning to the end in the life of Quinn Fabray. Since then, every glance, every instant with Rachel Berry had been a pain in her side, one which grew into an insufferable shroud that led her into the mounting mess she now faced.

Rachel was going to ruin everything.

Santana _knew _for heaven's sake! She was finished!

All because Rachel was trying to force all of their undisclosed interactions into the light, a place Quinn could not have them. It was already falling apart all around her; after all she had broken it all from the start. She couldn't face the devastation of her and Rachel's…relationship, not the one she had been running from since the start.

Quinn slumped against a set of lockers near the main entrance to the school and let her head fall against the cool metal. It was nearly refreshing against her heated mind. She was drained. In fact, she'd been running without motivation for so long now. Her only saving grace was that if she didn't stop, she wouldn't have to face what she never had in the first place.

Quinn had, obviously, been dutiful to her life plan and run away from any of the tiny thoughts that perked up in her mind when she thought of the small girl; she was nobody after all. It was easy to bury the thoughts and budding curiosities and blend into the status quo of McKinley, the status quo that placed her at the very top and Rachel Berry at the very bottom. So it was only natural that Quinn thought of the tiny diva every now and again, it was basically law to torture the girl at every turn. It didn't hurt that this was the perfect excu…reason to think of the girl every now and again. And it had worked sufficiently well until the girl had managed to sink her little fingers into Finn Hudson.

That, by every measure in Quinn's mind was absolutely unacceptable. First of all, Finn was her boyfriend and obviously off limits. Secondly, Berry was a pitiful loser and had no business with the quarterback of the football team, but apparently the girl had convinced Finn that he could _sing_. It was a pathetic attempt to get close to the boy, honestly couldn't she think of anything better and less…well, lame? Furthermore, and perhaps most infuriating was that their pairing was all wrong. Rachel looked so misfit with the giant quarterback. He towered over her and when he swept her into his arms she would be swallowed so that only a few patches of her sweater were visible.

Either way, it was _not_ going to happen. So when Coach Sylvester demanded that she and Santana spy on them for something to do with the Cherrio's budget, Quinn had done so obediently. They followed her gullible boyfriend to the auditorium where the glee club, which Berry was apparently part of, to see just what stupid plan the girl had cooked up.

This, Quinn would later learn, was also a monumental mistake. The club had consisted of about six kids, a large black girl, a kid in a wheel chair, some Asian girl, a small very feminine boy, Finn apparently, and Rachel freaking Berry. That was the first and last time she noticed anyone else on that stage besides Rachel.

When Rachel stepped forward and started singing, Quinn was immobilized. The girl had an incredible voice that rang with such clarity and _feeling, _Quinn couldn't help but fall victim to the trance it put her in, and the look of pure joy on the performer's face while she sang made Quinn melt a little where she stood.

She _should_ have noticed that she was staring. She _should_ have noticed the way her _boyfriend_ was looking at the other girl. Instead the only thing she noticed was that Rachel Berry was… kind of beautiful.

Even when the number finished, Quinn couldn't look away from that beaming smile the girl wore, she wasn't even aware that a smile of her own had taken root on the corner of her lips until Santana's elbow met her side sharply. When Quinn had turned to glare at the Latina, she was met with a curious eyebrow.

Later Quinn had been informed by Coach Sylvester that she, Santana, and the third member of the unholy trinity, Britney, were to join glee club as spies.

If she hadn't known that Rachel Berry would surely be the end of her, she really should have known right then.

Quinn could have sworn that Rachel tried her absolute hardest to make Quinn's life a mess. If the whole debacle of Rachel trying to steal her boyfriend hadn't been enough, then she had to go and out Quinn's secret of who the father of her baby really was. At every turn Rachel was annoying and somehow always made things ten times harder for the blond, mostly because she was always around.

Sure Quinn wasn't exactly nice to the diva either, but she couldn't help it! For one, it was high school and that was just how things worked, or at least that's what Quinn told herself every night. But there was also the fact that Rachel was inching her way into Quinn's life. So Quinn did what she did best, she fought and threw insults at the girl practically begging her to mind her own damn business and just go away.

Rachel didn't of course. She was always there.

She was the first to find Quinn after Finn had found out about the cheating. She was the one who tried to tell her that she was accepted. She was the one who sucked Quinn in with those misty brown eyes when they sang Keep Holding On and she was the one that grabbed her hand and didn't let go when the music stopped.

And somehow, after every threat and insult, she always ended up right back where she started: sitting behind the damn brunette in glee club.

If everything had remained that way, maybe it wouldn't be like this now. Maybe Quinn would feel as though she had some inkling of where the ground was under her feet and some understanding of what the hell her life was coming to. Maybe she wouldn't feel like her mind was in a cyclone, constantly bombarded with…well, everything. And maybe it wouldn't feel as if her heart was in a blender, all of the time. Or that her lungs seemed to cease their function in the most inconvenient times. Or that her body became uncontrollable at even more inconvenient times.

But as she'd learned recently, many things in Quinn Fabray's life were out of her control.

Everything had started to change when Rachel wanted to write her stupid original song for regionals. Well, Quinn hadn't thought it was entirely stupid because her apparently that had been one of the moments where her body acted out of her control. She'd _offered_ to help write the song and convinced everyone that they should sing it.

Quinn really couldn't find an explanation for why she'd decided it was a good idea to help Rachel, but she preferred not to dwell on the fact.

_Quinn sat at the piano, idly stroking out some melody she'd learned to play when she was younger, while waiting for the self-proclaimed diva to show up. Sure it was easy to say she'd decided to take a play out of one Sue Sylvester's book "keep your enemies close", but that didn't exactly explain the anticipatory feeling running through her veins. _

"_I didn't know you could play." _

_Quinn looked up from the black and white keys and acknowledged the girl briefly. "I took lessons for years till my father decided I should do something more active." The words slipped out so casually she hadn't stopped to think that it was actually something she'd never bothered to tell anyone before. _

_Rachel smiled softly and nodded. It seemed as if she knew that somehow, but made no move to comment further. _

"_So, Quinn, I know we haven't spent a lot of time together this year-"_

"_Berry, we never spend time together." Quinn stated dryly. That was more like it, she thought. _

"_Yes, well. We're sort of friends, right?"_

_Quinn thought about it for a moment. Were her and Rachel friends? Certainty not in the traditional sense, but as much as she wished to deny it, there was something between them besides the rude comments and boyfriend stealing. It felt as if there always had been._

"_Sure."_

"_Well, I was thinking that we sort of bonded over last year." Rachel continued, her words seemed increasingly unsure._

"_I suppose we do have a rather," Quinn paused, thinking of a word to describe their friendship or whatever it was. "Unique, history."_

_Rachel swallowed harder than she meant to. "Yes, that would be a good way to describe it."_

_Quinn raised an eyebrow at the brunette. She was acting...oddly. If the uncertainty of her voice had been any clue, the absent rambling was painfully noticeable. _

_Seeing Quinn's questioning expression, Rachel attempted to continue. "I wanted to, well…ask you about your, um, feelings."_

"_My feelings?" Quinn's eyebrow rose even higher._

"_Yes well, I wanted to know if you-"_

"_Look Berry, you really need to stop asking me about Finn. We're dating again, okay? It's been a few weeks now." Quinn sighed exasperatedly. She really didn't want to talk about the boy anymore. Sure they'd started dating again after she'd cheated on Sam. She never did understand why she couldn't hold down a boyfriend. Shouldn't things like that be more, I don't know, permanent? _

"_Oh, um. That isn't what-" Rachel stuttered slightly. She looked as if something had hit her rather hard in the chest and knocked the wind out of her. _

_Quinn felt a slight tug in her own chest. _

"_Isn't what Rachel?" She prompted before she could think of the feeling._

"_I- I wanted…" She was still sputtering lightly. She seemed to be breathing normally, but now just looked completely caught off guard. _

"_Look Rachel, he chose me. So you can stop giving him all of your big misty brown eye gazes and longing after him when we walk down the hallway together okay?" Quinn's hands hit the top of the piano as she rose. It was always like this when Finn was brought up between them. Quinn felt a burning feeling rise within her and race like wildfire through her vein's. It always made her mad, so quickly. It wasn't so much that she was in love with Finn, but why did Rachel always feel she had a right to what was hers! She couldn't just bat her ridiculously long eyelashes and have everyone following her around like lost puppies. Quinn would just, not, have it. _

"_Quinn, that's not-"_

"_Not what, Berry. Not fair?" Quinn felt her temper rising to dangerous levels. Quinn needed to be in control, it was what had always been engrained in her, but this little…girl! She made Quinn absolutely lose her mind! She wanted it to stop, once and for all. It made her absolutely sick that she had to watch the Rachel and Finn sing duets together every day while he pawed at her, hated watching the girl avert her gaze guiltily every time Quinn caught her staring their way. "Life isn't fair Berry! You don't get to have everything you want. Okay? So don't serenade him with your incredible voice and pour your soul into those ballads while he's holding MY hand!" Quinn stalked towards Rachel now, her finger pointing accusingly at the stunned diva. "No more wearing your sinfully short skirts and bending down when Finn walks by –"_

"_Quinn! you-" The tension in the room was palpable as Quinn moved flush up against Rachel, trapping her between the piano and herself. The brunette bucked slightly as Quinn literally seethed. _

"_No Berry! You think that I don't notice? You're using the same tricks you used back in sophomore year when you tried to steal him while I was pregnant! God damn it Berry! Why can't you just stay out of my life! You're always meddling and I just don't understand why! Even when you had Finn you still couldn't leave me alone! You make me feel like I'm constantly going to throw up just from looking at you and my skin crawls when you get too close to me!" _

_Somewhere during her rant, Quinn had grown frantic and nearly hysterical. She couldn't stop her mouth from moving or the words that flowed so uncontrollably. She was hardly thinking as she'd encroached on the diva and now with their bodies flush against each other, Quinn was sure she was seeing black spots everywhere. She just wanted to know why. It was killing her to see the brunette every day for the past three years. It seemed with every passing day these feelings surmounted until they exploded from her the way they were now. She just couldn't understand._

"_I can't STAND yo-!"_

_And then, Quinn wasn't yelling anymore. The surmounting fury in her veins, the aching burning in her chest, the deafening screaming in her mind, and the painful clenching of her fists stopped for one sweet instant. _

_In that instant, she noticed several things. There were tiny, delicate hands clutching either side of her face; weaving into her wavy hair and pulling at her scalp, coxing her further forward. There was a sweet aroma filling her senses and warm air on her face. There was the softest, most incredible pair of lips, on hers molding them together in the most blissful heat she'd ever known. _

_And then she knew there was absolute pleasure running through her veins. The aching in her chest seemed whole for once and ready to burst. Her mind was screaming in appreciation and begging her not to stop. And her fists, they were buried in Rachel's shirt and pulling her further in. _

_It was, definitely, nothing like she'd ever felt before. _

_Quinn pulled Rachel into her hard and then wrapped her arms around the small girl's waist. As soon as she realized Rachel's lips were on hers she opened her mouth to deepen the kiss and taste every inch of Rachel's mouth returned the kiss with fever. It was intoxicating. The hands tangled in her hair caused spikes of pleasure to shoot through her spine as she reveled in how desperate Rachel's kiss was. The girl released one hand only to claw at the ex-cheerleader's back. _

_Quinn groaned and pushed her body into Rachel's causing her hip to rub against Rachel's center. The smaller girl moaned delectably into the kiss and pushed back wantonly attempting to recreate the friction. _

_Rachel's insistent moving against Quinn caused her to knock the books off the piano, which hit the floor with an echoing bang._

_Quinn and Rachel leapt apart at the noise, staring at each other, panting with dark eyes._

_They each held mirrored expressions, but when Quinn saw the utter desperation and clear longing in Rachel's eyes she froze. _

_She knew that look. She'd seen it across hallways and in the girl's eyes when she sang all those love songs. She definitely knew that look. It was the same one that she despised seeing in the singer's eyes. The one she'd always seen Rachel cast towards Finn whenever he was with Quinn, so why…_

"_Quinn…" Rachel whispered, as if she were afraid any sudden movements would cause the girl to lash out. _

_Quinn felt her stomach drop out, her heart was pounding in her ears, but she still heard the girl perfectly. If she'd thought she was seeing black spots before, she really was now. Her mind was, well actually everything was spinning. _

"_Quinn?" _

_The blonde's eyes snapped towards Rachel, fear building in them with every passing second. _

_She had just kissed Rachel Berry. She had just. Kissed. Rachel. Freaking. Berry. _

_Rachel seemed to inch closer as if she were trying to corral the spooked girl. The instant soft tan fingers touched her arm, Quinn was scrambling. She nearly fell over herself, running away, vaguely aware of Rachel calling after her. _

Quinn sighed a heavy breath. How was it possible that she hadn't known till then? How could she have possibly believed that emotions like _that _could have been as simple as distain?

Before she noticed the wetness on her cheeks, tears were splattering solely on the dirty tiled floor.

It had been right in front of her the entire time. _She _had been right there and _she _had _wanted _her. _Rachel _had wanted her, as clear as the brunette had on prom night.

Why had it taken her _so_ long to see it? And Finally, when she finally had her, kissed the girl she loved with such abandonment and loved her until the only sounds to fill the room were rasped breathes fading into sleep, she let fear and insecurity settle into her chest rather than the disheveled brunette.

Quinn had snuck out the back door as if it was just a quick fuck and left Rachel with nothing but a fading soreness and a few drops of scarlet on her sheets.


End file.
